ME Contest: Get The Most Passes to Lone Striker!

[acmilano112000]

Using a single-striker tactic, what is the most passes received by the striker you can get in a match?

* RULES: Excluding throw ins (just count them and deduct). Non-extra time. Striker may be positioned any of the central slots, not on the wing. Strikerless tactic with a single-AMC acting as "striker" counts but will be given an asterisk. You may show AI teams (but then we won't fully know their tactics). No crosses received - for now lets keep it simpler and just look at passes.

Please post your results with a screenshot if possible and if it is a good result then please share a shot of your tactics too!

 

My experience is that the ME is having big trouble with involvement of strikers in single-striker formations. Which, in turn, leads to many of the ME issues being complained about (low scoring strikers, no central attacking play, etc etc). Let's find out literally the most we can force the ME to involve our lone strikers. My hunch is it will be astonishingly low.

In a match page, go to Analysis > Players then select your team and click Passes in the dropdown menu. Then click on the Prd box for the striker so they show on the map. Deduct ones coming from past the sidelines that are obviously throw ins.

 

Here's my entry to start. Cavani recieved 2 passes in a 90 minute game.

One looks like a long ball from defense. Seems Strasbourg played a tactic with a lot of central bodies, but PSG also figured to have lots of possession (certainly won a lot of throw ins lol). Striker was just a 90 minute decoy. Couldn't work anything at all to him while they probed around for an opening?

PSG v Strasbourg. AI vs AI. December season 1.

Edited November 29, 2019 by acmilano112000

[srvngrc]

This ME bugs getting funnier everyday. It's time to make an update i think. Otherwise we may see lots of threads like that.

[Svenc]

Is this purely About trying to game the numbers up? First attempt, albeit a pre-season friendly against the own U19 (if they Count). Should be About 26 excluding throws. Forward movement has been acknowledged anyway, but then those 2 by the AI should be rather easy to beat. More interesting was it playing the same Strasbourg side (the U19 tactically mimics yours typically -- the U19 central Forward (WHITE) received 13ish passes considering that before getting subbed -- throwins not included).  They had 28% of Possession total.

Edited November 29, 2019 by Svenc

[acmilano112000]

@Svenc Solid entry! Lol. "about 26" is the new number to beat!

Its ok that it was against own U-19s. But important to note. Looks like Bayern completed a TON of passes in such an unbalanced game (quick math, like almost 800). So is 26 of those, half around midfield, anywhere near what we would expect? Hard to say. I'd say its still pretty low. Especially since your striker was a Target Man. Doesn't seem like he was targetted much. 26/700? When you are presumably completely dominating the other team and parked in their third... only a handful of passes received near their box.

I'm picturing Bayern playing a vastly inferior team like this and completing approx 800 passes, they must be surrounding the opponents deep defense on the edge of the box and moving the ball around a lot to try to probe for space. I'd expect that the central striker would be the target of passes as much as possible with his back to goal to give a 1-2 or flick or lay on to someone to shoot (and because they're so far forward, any other player with the ball would at least be close enough to him to target him).

Anyhow, we can hypothetical forever, but I think the data speaks for itself. Of course the ME is never going to be exactly perfect, but painting with large strokes here I think this is a helpful exercise to see if we are even whatsoever close to normal.

Thanks for the entry!

 

RE: your question "is this purely about trying to game the numbers up?" -- not explicitly, but yes that's fine too. I'm curious both what the numbers are naturally in this ME, as well as what tactical tricks and workarounds it would take to get them up as high as we can. I'd like to play a 1 striker tactic, but so far I literally can't figure out how to if I want any semblance of realistic play from the focal point of the entire concept.

Edited November 29, 2019 by acmilano112000

[Svenc]

56 minutes ago, acmilano112000 said:

@Svenc  Especially since your striker was a Target Man.

Trequartista. There's likely a couple combinations that may make the FWD more involved though, yes. In particular considering that the FWD is sitting up top, you'd Need to be a bit more aggressive than Recycling the ball (that's what I did) -- close to 900 passes btw and a lot of which deeper on the pitch. Excluding the duties, I basically copied some of my stuff I used back then when trying to hold onto a lead to get the passes over the Team generally up. May be worth another couple Experiments.  

I would think that actual Football data collected includes the throw-ins though. Thus if you, or SI, or anybody wanted to compare, you'd have to make sure and check. Plus naturally, in regards to central forward underperformances, this won't be About the amount of passes -- but the Quality thereof -- how much involved the Forwards as to FM may generally be involved in the final third. That is, with reasonably "attacking" tactics, unlike mine. 

Some numbrs from the 2014/2015 Season in Serie A, as an example. 

 

Typically, and with some balanced tactics, you'd expect a forward thus to have 6-7% of the passes a Team receives, on average -- over the Course of the season. In the above that would be, all inclusive, Müller with 42 off 898, that would be the lowly end of 4,7%. Source: StatsBomb. https://statsbomb.com/2015/11/flavio/

Edited November 29, 2019 by Svenc

[amberhelix]

I suspect SI know exactly how to get strikers to move more, receive the ball in space more, finish their one-on-ones, and get wide attackers to stop hitting the side netting and cut easy balls back.... but your score lines will be 15-14 rugby scores. I think it's all balanced to realistic scorelines and any change to the now obvious 'nerfs' to strikers the past couple of years is not an easy fix that satisfies realistic football simulation. They went down a dead end by killing central forward play a while back - to get it back they now need to walk the knife edge that is touching anything in this dated spaghetti-code engine without breaking something else. I'll bet they're tearing their hair out quite honestly!

[herne79]

Two examples from two different systems I've used.  For context, these are competitive matches I've already played (so I'm not trying to set up solely to get my striker involved) against two different teams - an elite team and a mid table team.  I'm playing as West Ham, so not exactly elite ourselves.  What I've tried to do here is look at two very different matches using very different tactical systems.

Match 1 vs Man City.  I'm playing a 4411 formation, just 2 TIs, my lone striker is an Advanced Forward and we're not playing a possession style.  Man City are playing a 4123DM possession system with Aguero as a lone striker.

My striker:- 23 passes received of which 5 were throw ins.  Perfectly happy with that given the quality of opposition and our play style.

By way of comparison, here's Aguero.  26 passes received of which 8 look like throw ins.  He also scored.

 

Match 2 vs Crystal Palace.  Striker played as a DLF(A).  This was a possession based 4123DM system designed to smother Palace's dangerous wing play.  We won 4-0.

My striker:- again 23 passes received of which 6 were throw ins.  He also scored twice (once from a corner, one from a 1v1).  You could argue the number of passes are a little on the low side here given it's a possession system, however possession without intent is useless and you still need someone leading the line (which he did well).

 

As a final thought @acmilano112000, the opening post is based on a striker receiving just 2 passes the entire match which is just the sort of extreme result that would be very difficult to replicate internally.  If you haven't already, I'd suggest creating a Bug report and uploading that pkm for the devs to analyse.  There may have been tactical things you could do to get your striker more involved in that match, however regardless of that I'd expect the quality of player / team to at least make up some ground and be more directly involved in open play regardless of tactic.

[Svenc]

57 minutes ago, herne79 said:

As a final thought @acmilano112000, the opening post is based on a striker receiving just 2 passes the entire match which is just the sort of extreme result that would be very difficult to replicate internally.  If you haven't already, I'd suggest creating a Bug report and uploading that pkm for the devs to analyse.  There may have been tactical things you could do to get your striker more involved in that match, however regardless of that I'd expect the quality of player / team to at least make up some ground and be more directly involved in open play regardless of tactic.

I think this was actually from an AI vs AI match unless I got him wrong. But then the AI can easily do plenty "fishy" stuff, as the tactics UI is a bit, er, complex. Additionally, if there would be something going on on a match specific Level, like a Forward struggling for space, the AI wouldn't be able to "read" it and rectify if possible. I think it's fair to assume that any human Player who "get the game" would have him more involved if he wanted to. Though perhaps not quite to the Degree that an average Forward may be involved in Football (see Serie A stats above). 23 passes received per match are on the lowly end all around, not sure About the percentages of the passes received total naturally.

 

Edited November 29, 2019 by Svenc

[acmilano112000]

3 hours ago, amberhelix said:

... to get [central forward play] back they now need to walk the knife edge that is touching anything in this dated spaghetti-code engine without breaking something else. I'll bet they're tearing their hair out quite honestly!

100%

@Svenc Duh, Treq. It was late. Thanks for bringing in that data from Serie A 2014-15. Be interesting to compare if we get more from FM. I should point out that in addition to throw ins (probably), those numbers also probably include crosses. For raw simplicity's sake I omitted crosses (sorta brings in lots more variables about player height, jumping, etc can mean ability to "receive" cross could lead to lots of targets but few completions... sort of a can of worms for these purposes).

Assuming that data doesn't include crosses, I'm worried the ME puts strikers on the low end (without trying to force ball to striker as you did). Assuming it does include crosses, it would put strikers off the charts low.

@herne79  Yes, the opening post was an AI vs AI match. (I was managing Nantes so had full detail Ligue 1 and knew that PSG play 1 striker so was looking at their games.) Don't misunderstand me, I certainly didn't create the topic in reaction to that game. I just put that one up as the opening example for fun because it was so astonishingly low. Could be a "bug" of some type. Although I consider all of this to be a "bug". Just not sure if it requires PKMs because my basic theory is this is a theme in every single game in the ME in a single striker system. To that point, it is probably also involved in any system, but people playing multiple strikers generally say their strikers do get involved. Could be because lack of options elsewhere, fewer wing players open, etc. So I'd expect that SI can look at this by just opening any old game.

Your examples seem nice, I'm glad to see them, thanks for sharing.

 

 

[herne79]

2 minutes ago, acmilano112000 said:

Just not sure if it requires PKMs because my basic theory is this is a theme in every single game in the ME in a single striker system.

Yes it requires pkms because without that the devs will be unable to investigate what happened in that (or any other) match.  Each match is essentially unique and while there may be commonality of the cause of issues from match to match there can still be differences in the causes.  Plus what may fix something in one match may not fix it (or break something else) in another match.

But as you can see, it doesn't affect every single game in single striker systems so no, I'm afraid SI can't just open any old game.

[noikeee]

Now let's try this only limited to lone strikers on a support role and in a formation with AML and AMR 

Target man role not allowed. 

Edited November 29, 2019 by noikeee

[Svenc]

12 minutes ago, acmilano112000 said:

Assuming that data doesn't include crosses, I'm worried the ME puts strikers on the low end (without trying to force ball to striker as you did). Assuming it does include crosses, it would put strikers off the charts low.

That's a really good Point. I don't know tbh either… Maybe one for SI staffers. As they may Research such data en more Detail, they probably ought to know..

[herne79]

1 hour ago, noikeee said:

Now let's try this only limited to lone strikers on a support role and in a formation with AML and AMR 

Target man role not allowed. 

Challenge accepted.

My next match vs Chelsea.  Playing the same 4123DM possession based system, except I changed my striker from a DLF(A) to a DLF(S).  It was 0-0 on 66 mins when I subbed my striker, we ended up winning 3-1 with Yarmolenko (AMR with an attack duty) grabbing a goal and 2 assists with my subbed on striker (Ajeti) scoring and providing an assist for Yarmo's goal.  Here's the passes received (27 passes total for the 2 strikers (including the sub) of which 5 were throw ins):

A nice variety of goals scored too:

1) Ajeti has dropped deep with the ball opening acres of space for the on rushing Yarmolenko who he passes to scores:

 

2) Yarmolenko has made it to the byline with the ball but instead of shooting he cuts it back to Ajeti who drops off his marker and scores:

 

3) Yarmolenko squares it for Lanzini on the edge of the box and scores:

 

fwiw here's my shots map as well:

[Icy]

For me the problem is not only the amount but where, barely any inside of the area as the issue is imho in the last 3rd of the field. Having an striker as F9 or DLF, etc they are involved in the initial build up, but if you dominate a game, once they reach the opponents 3rd, they seems to stay back to goal as if all them were target men.

[noikeee]

12 minutes ago, herne79 said:

Challenge accepted.

My next match vs Chelsea.  Playing the same 4123DM possession based system, except I changed my striker from a DLF(A) to a DLF(S).  It was 0-0 on 66 mins when I subbed my striker, we ended up winning 3-1 with Yarmolenko (AMR with an attack duty) grabbing a goal and 2 assists with my subbed on striker (Ajeti) scoring and providing an assist for Yarmo's goal.  Here's the passes received (27 passes total for the 2 strikers (including the sub) of which 5 were throw ins):

Interesting, my experience just isn't the same with much less involved strikers. Again could be something to do with this match being one of those heavy underdog matches in which the opposition gives space to counter in. Even then my experience is the team is usually much more eager to play into the wingers though, so I'm not sure what causes such dramatic differences.

[herne79]

2 minutes ago, noikeee said:

so I'm not sure what causes such dramatic differences

Tactics?  Match build up?  Match management? Just take that last one for example - it was 0-0 when I made 3 substitutions (not all at the same time but all before I scored) for different types of players.  I changed my striker and two of my midfielders for more creative midfielders (Rice and Noble for Wilshere and Lanzini).  I also used touchline shouts to my advantage.  We scored our first within 5 mins of my final sub and two more after that.

[noikeee]

No I'm not talking about overachieving in general, I mean specifically getting deep/supporting strikers involved in build-up in a useful way. Not sure how you made that work because in some setups it feels impossible.

[isignedupfornorealreason]

27 minutes ago, noikeee said:

Not sure how you made that work because in some setups it feels impossible.

It's not impossible, it's just Herne knows his way around tactical set ups. :P

[herne79]

8 minutes ago, isignedupfornorealreason said:

It's not impossible, it's just Herne knows his way around tactical set ups. :P

I do (usually ) but go back to my post above, it isn't just about the tactic.  I made 3 impact subs for different types of players plus some handy touchline shouts.

As Cleon always used to say, it's pointless subbing off someone just to bring on his twin brother.  Have options from the bench - different types of player.

[isignedupfornorealreason]

10 hours ago, acmilano112000 said:

Please post your results with a screenshot if possible and if it is a good result then please share a shot of your tactics too!

Eh, I will do screenshots later if it's needed, but for now I'll just write the stats down.

For the record, I play 4-3-3. IF/A, DLF/S, W/S.

The midfield is usually a Mez/A with a DLP/S and DM behind. I did start switching the striker to an AF/A in the later fixtures to see if he gets more involved in opening up space, especially when opponents come out of their shells;

Format is: Match number, opponent, score, total passes, total throw ins., then passes - throw ins.

1: Senglea (A) 6-0 28 passes, 16 throw ins (12)

2: Senglea (H) 6-0 22 passes, 9 throw ins (13)

3. APOEL (H) 6-0 19 passes, 6 throw ins (12) (Subbed 75 mins)  scored./ Replacement: 5 passes, 4 throw ins (1) 

4. APOEL (A) 0-1 22 passes, 12 throw ins (10)

5. Hibs (H) 3-0 16 passes, 8 throw ins (8) scored.

6. SKW (A) 1-1 32 passes, 8 throw ins (24)

7. Ross C (A) 1-1 29 passes, 5 throw ins (24) scored.

8. SKW (H) 1-0 23 passes, 11 throw ins (12)

9. Falkirk (A) 3-0 25 passes, 6 throw ins (19)

10. AEK (H) 3-0 15 passes, 10 throw ins (5) scored believe it or not.

11. Livingstone (H) 3-0 33 passes, 19 throw ins (14) scored.

12. AEK (A) 2-1 23 passes, 10 throw ins (13)

 

Hmm, I guess it is a bit on the low side in some of my games. He's not on penalty duties in any case.

[Rashidi]

Out of curiosity, I wanted to see what would happen if I managed Porto in the champions league, naturally i expect some sides to be very defensive and others to be fairly attacking. Against Chelsea we spent most of the time defending, still managed to do some decent possession numbers as our goal was simply to hang on to the ball long enough to do something with it.

27 passes in this game with around i think 10 from throw ins, its not a high number but under the circumstances against a better team where we needed quick transitions I was still surprised. 

I am usually more interested in things like key passes and linking play up with midfield or being the cog in attack, dropping back to play others in and I am looking to see him receive those kind of central passes. 
 

Against defensive opposition who don't give us too much space i am only looking to see that he receives passes in good areas, and contributing with goals.

In this match I had to take Aboubakar off for Ze Luis because we were going nowhere in breaking this side down.

Again it isn't the number of passes but how the passes helped me get into the final attacking transition.  I have to admit if someone only gets 2 prd for a striker in this game, its usually a sign that either:  Your lone forward is really bad at finding space, the defence was playing with perhaps 2 DMs and he was caught in the pocket between defenders and DM, which suggests that tactically you didn't do enough to draw them out.

However if you did all this and he still generates really low passes received then send in the pkm. I think 20-40 passes received depending on the system you are using should be commonplace. 

 

 

 

[acmilano112000]

6 hours ago, Rashidi said:

I am usually more interested in things like key passes and linking play up with midfield or being the cog in attack, dropping back to play others in and I am looking to see him receive those kind of central passes. 

Agreed. This little Prd experiment is sort of a crude way of looking at the overall picture here, but certainly those deeper things are more important. I think the Prd is sort of a quick thing we can compare more easily between each other without getting too caught up in what tactic exactly, what team, what familiarity, what opponent etc etc. Gives a sense of whether or not there is an issue here.

Linking up play as you describe is very much my intent from my single striker. I like to explore Pep's concepts of free eights at City when I'm facing a deep defense. Not to get into my tactic specifically, but my concept is that I want to have my CMs run beyond the dropping-off striker into the space they left, or have the striker turn to shoot if the CBs don't step out with them. In FM17 I had such a great long save where I was getting great variations on this basic idea and lots of passing interactions between the ST - CM - CM triangle. Which obviously requires vertical forward passes from the CM to the ST to sort of begin the idea. Here in FM20 I'm returning to this idea but cannot get any meaningful looks from the CMs to pass the ball forward into the ST. And yes I've tried many many role combinations including ones that used to work, and it's mid season and everyone is familiar, etc. The CMs are just obsessed with passing to the free winger or fullback.

Anyhow, all that to say that this bigger idea of lone striker receiving enough passes is very important as the originating concept of many many tactical forms and ideas. The more specific tactical ingredients and combos you say you look for aren't going to happen enough if the basic idea of looking for the forward is not occurring enough.

[robinthebest]

12 hours ago, herne79 said:

Two examples from two different systems I've used.  For context, these are competitive matches I've already played (so I'm not trying to set up solely to get my striker involved) against two different teams - an elite team and a mid table team.  I'm playing as West Ham, so not exactly elite ourselves.  What I've tried to do here is look at two very different matches using very different tactical systems.

Match 1 vs Man City.  I'm playing a 4411 formation, just 2 TIs, my lone striker is an Advanced Forward and we're not playing a possession style.  Man City are playing a 4123DM possession system with Aguero as a lone striker.

My striker:- 23 passes received of which 5 were throw ins.  Perfectly happy with that given the quality of opposition and our play style.

By way of comparison, here's Aguero.  26 passes received of which 8 look like throw ins.  He also scored.

 

Match 2 vs Crystal Palace.  Striker played as a DLF(A).  This was a possession based 4123DM system designed to smother Palace's dangerous wing play.  We won 4-0.

My striker:- again 23 passes received of which 6 were throw ins.  He also scored twice (once from a corner, one from a 1v1).  You could argue the number of passes are a little on the low side here given it's a possession system, however possession without intent is useless and you still need someone leading the line (which he did well).

 

As a final thought @acmilano112000, the opening post is based on a striker receiving just 2 passes the entire match which is just the sort of extreme result that would be very difficult to replicate internally.  If you haven't already, I'd suggest creating a Bug report and uploading that pkm for the devs to analyse.  There may have been tactical things you could do to get your striker more involved in that match, however regardless of that I'd expect the quality of player / team to at least make up some ground and be more directly involved in open play regardless of tactic.

the match engine would not be able to create a Rondon at Newcastle last season type of striker, or a Giroud at France type, who is dropping back a lot, not exactly a target man, but involve a lot

 

you cannot say it's a bug, but the ME flaws

Edited November 30, 2019 by robinthebest

[herne79]

8 hours ago, robinthebest said:

the match engine would not be able to create a Rondon at Newcastle last season type of striker, or a Giroud at France type, who is dropping back a lot, not exactly a target man, but involve a lot

 

you cannot say it's a bug, but the ME flaws

Not sure what this has to do with my post?  I haven't tried setting up my strikers in either of those two systems as Rondon or Giroud, nor have I tried setting up to specifically get my striker involved (as said above).

You say the ME is not capable of creating Rondon or Giroud, so I take it you have tried.  What particular deficiencies did you notice?  What were your tactical settings?  How many passes did Rondon in real life receive on average last season?

[Svenc]

As the AI Managers typically make up the majority of a save, I tried to do something a Little bit different.

It failed though.

I was Looking for whether you could enter a column into the squad's screen showing "passes received per 90 minutes". Unfortunately, there doesn't appear to be such a column. Even though the stat itself for the individual match exists. Whilst there is naturally a correlation to "passes attempted per 90 minutes", it wouldn'T be quite the same thing. Still, the "passes attempted per 90 minutes" throughout the AI Squads typically Clocks in the ~20 range in General, lone Forwards included. Bayern's Lewandowski in my Bundesliga sim averaged 27 passes per match (full match Details).

OT: What's interesting to me is that the CBs don't seem to lag as much behind as they used to on Prior Releases. So they seem somewhat more involved on the ball than used to on a couple Prior releases, as there was a tendency to clear the ball out of the backline quickly (and never play it back). Still not quite near as much as for Pep's Teams. But then on FM they oft hang back and are "out of the game" when the ball has transitioned into the final third, as else they'd put one of the Forwards Camping at the half way line onside. There's CBs that average more passing attempts than central midfielders. And this with sides such as Gladbach sitting 3rd, e.g. the AI not being on TIME WASTING MODE.  

Edited November 30, 2019 by Svenc

[Mitja]

How many passes received would be avarage irl for forwards? Just had a game where my striker on attack duty received 4 passes from open play. And MC playmaker 150. There is an big problem passing forward in possession style tactics when using higher def-line. It  happens too many times that forwards are ignored with plain simple pass. Also full-backs see too much of the ball, even when attacking wide players are open, there's tendency to play it safe to full-back. I guess it doesn+t help all FBs have gets futher forward and runs down the line PPMs too. Hope this is patched soon, really anoying because ME is very good otherwise.    

[Svenc]

16 minutes ago, Mitja said:

How many passes received would be avarage irl for forwards? Just had a game where my striker on attack duty received 4 passes from open play. And MC playmaker 150. 
I guess it doesn+t help all FBs have gets futher forward and runs down the line PPMs too.

I hate it that the Research Hand These Kind of PPMs out like they're free candy. "Gets further Forward" to me is the Definition of tactical illdiscipline anyway, plus I'd argue there would be very few fullbacks who would still just engage into a dribble even if discouraged to do so (Marcelo, Maybe)?  

Is that an AMC or MC? Attack Duty Forwards will look to surge Forward, creating a gap and disconnect between the MC positions and the FWD. Playmakers typically aren't runners who look to close that gap. I did actually raise this as to FM 16ish as to AI Pep's tactics. Played a 4-1-4-1 (courtesy of German Research), and had Lewandowski spearheading it all. Apparently it was Modus Operandi for the AI to (Always) have a Forward on attack Duty. The result as to Pep was not realistic. Arguably was also part of why he underperformed Pretty frequently (sometimes less than 60 Goals first Season with one of the most dominatingn domestic Squads at that time).

I think there were a couple good Points made in the above. In finding the issues, one should look at the Quality instead the quantity. And use the numbers as tool/benchmark, whilst analysing what actually happens on FM's pitches for those numbers to come about. Serie A averages were posted above. It's usually around ~25ish, or 5-7 of all passes a Team receives total.

Edited November 30, 2019 by Svenc

[Mitja]

27 minutes ago, Svenc said:

I hate it that the Research Hand These Kind of PPMs out like they're free candy. "Gets further Forward" to me is the Definition of tactical illdiscipline anyway, plus I'd argue there would be very few fullbacks who would still just engage into a dribble even if discouraged to do so (Marcelo, Maybe)?  

It looks EPL is defenetely full of Marcelos. GFF is such a basic instruction, I really don't understand why researchers asign it so easily..  

27 minutes ago, Svenc said:

Is that an AMC or MC?

MC. Drom what I researched, DCs could still have few touches more on account of MCs, eventhough as you noted this is reflected much better now. Wide forwards receive too few balls. That must be connected to the fact they go into the box too early especially when the ball is on their side of the pitch, which then leaves FBs in plenty of space. I'm still undeceided about central forwards, it looks like passes received is on lower end currently. 

Edited November 30, 2019 by Mitja

[herne79]

12 hours ago, acmilano112000 said:

The more specific tactical ingredients and combos you say you look for aren't going to happen enough if the basic idea of looking for the forward is not occurring enough.

Define "enough"?

Clearly 2 passes received by a striker isn't "enough".  But what is?  In one of my examples above we beat Chelsea 3-1 with my lone strikers (I used a sub) scoring a goal, making an assist, receiving 22 passes (excluding throw ins), attempted 25 passes and were fully involved in the match.  Without their movement, Yarmolenko wouldn't have scored and neither would my striker.  For me, in that particular example (and my other 2 examples), that's more than enough.

The number of passes received is only one aspect and it's just a statistic.  Focussing on just one aspect or statistic can (not always - 2 passes acknowledged) be misleading.  Some people may say receiving 22 passes isn't "enough" if looking in isolation at things, but that doesn't always paint the whole picture.

So yeh, your striker may or may not be receiving lots of passes, but that doesn't necessarily mean he's standing around doing nothing.

As an example, look at Lewandowski this season, the archetypal heavily involved complete forward.  I can't see passes received for him anywhere, but he averages 24 passes attempted per match (whoscored.com).  In last week's ECL match vs Zvezda, he scored 4 goals and attempted 19 passes.  Is that "enough"?  I'd say so, however judging by some comments those passes perhaps aren't.

So statistics in isolation are one thing, overall contribution is something else entirely.  But I'll repeat something from my first post in this thread, a striker receiving just 2 passes the entire match...is just the sort of extreme result that would be very difficult to replicate internally.  Those types of examples should be bug reports.

[Svenc]

1 hour ago, Mitja said:

It looks EPL is defenetely full of Marcelos. GFF is such a basic instruction, I really don't understand why researchers asign it so easily..  

And it depends on the Country Research too, so this can wildly differ. The German one luckily recognizes this is to be handed out with some thoughtfulness. I don't think Players / backs are inherently being brought up / trained to bomb Forward in England, Spain, etc. either, or are they. 

Edited November 30, 2019 by Svenc

[noikeee]

1 hour ago, Svenc said:

I hate it that the Research Hand These Kind of PPMs out like they're free candy.

Yeah this is a problem. You look at some top players in some leagues and most of them have like 5 or 6 traits, well.... might as well not use any tactical instructions, play whatever way you want then. 

My particular pet peeve is players who have traits like "tries killer balls" + "tries to beat man repeatedly" + "shoots from distance". Okay so when you get the ball on the pitch, which of your 3 preferred moves will you attempt? Can you call it a preferred move when you have 3 different options that you all prefer equally? Or "dictates tempo" + "tries killer balls".... so you like to slow the game down but also like playing rushed hollywood balls?

I also think a lot of researchers don't realize that adding a trait has a pretty big chance of making a player stubborn and blinkered. "Tries killer balls", depending on which version of FM you are and how the ME reacts to it, might make your player incapable of biding his time and waiting for a gap, and just rush through Hollywood passes - now look at just how many top players in the database have this trait, and how they are very intelligent players in real life that would do pretty much the opposite.

[MBarbaric]

1 ora fa, Svenc ha scritto:

And it depends on the Country Research too, so this can wildly differ. The German one luckily recognizes this is to be handed out with some thoughtfulness. I don't think Players / backs are inherently being brought up / trained to bomb Forward in England, Spain, etc. either, or are they. 

I'd agree with this. a lot of player preferred moves aren't prefered moves but tactical decision by a manager. tries tricks would be a PPM, or Attempts overhead kicks. However, a full back bombing forward (can be) but isn't necessary. Depending on coaches instructions the same full back can one match immediately move forward as soon as team gets the ball while in the second he might be much more cautious. The same goes for drops deep to pick the ball. That (usually) isn't something that player decides out of his own mind but rather a tactical setup. 

Especially annoying is that if you want to change your tactical approach, you'd need to get the player to unlearn specific trait and learn a new one. 

[acmilano112000]

3 hours ago, herne79 said:

So statistics in isolation are one thing, overall contribution is something else entirely.

@herne79 I don't think we're saying as different things as it may seem. When you say, "Define "enough" [involvement of passes to the Striker]"... well, I don't really want to because every manager would have a different threshold of what they want based on their tactics. I know you'd agree. So the purpose of this thread was to, as I've said, probe this statistic in a crude way to see if what we are seeing is even in the ballpark of the loose realm that managers might consider "enough."

Passes Received is absolutely a statistic in isolation as you say, but it is deliberately chosen because it is just that. A simple stat that gives us a rough sense of passing play involving the forward. I wanted to find a simple single stat that we could compare because if we attempted to look at the overall contribution all at once, I felt like there would be too many tactical and preferential variables and the discussion would be more like "well your tactics are different" "well I'm playing counter attack" etc etc.

I totally agree of course that the overall value of a Striker's usefulness is so so so much more than how many passes they receive. But for discussions sake to get a basic sense of what is happening and possible in the ME, that seemed like a good stat to look at and talk about in detail, while trying to avoid going into further tactical variables. As I said, I personally try to play a tactical system with a lone striker who drops deeper to link play. In the past, depending on other factors of course, this has been a F9, DLF, Complete Fwd type of thing. I also know that lots of other popular tactical frameworks require a forward doing this sort of thing. Loosely defined. (Everyone has their little nuances.) So for this, passes received carries a lot of weight. I'm not saying my striker is worthless, but to play this tactical style in a large sense, we need the ability to get the ME to look for and play passes to the striker. So this little idea/exercise of being contrived to see how many we can get or find is interesting.

If other people are going for a tactical style with a lone striker sitting on the last man stretching the field deep and making forward runs, like a P or AF type thing, then maybe very few passes received and clearing space and tapping in two crosses per game is perfect. I think this ME looks like it can accommodate that. I'm not sure still if it can accommodate the opposite.

In whole, what you remind us about looking at the whole picture is of course important, so totally agree. In this topic though, that caveat said, I'm looking at a particular thing.

 

[herne79]

@acmilano112000  I understand where you're coming from.  I agree passes received can be at least an indication of striker involvement in build up play, although the overall tactical system needs context.  Out of interest, how exactly are your strikers doing?  Your OP mentions an AI v AI match but you haven't shown any stats for your own?  What sort of tactical system(s) are you using?  What roles/duties do your strikers & players around them have?  How is your team performing overall?